Portfolio Reviews Are Fucking Nonsense.

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THE BUY ART FAIR.

I bought some art today. I went to THE BUY ART FAIR and bought the above plate, a couple of little collectors books and a T.Shirt by Tracey Emin. I like Tracey Emin she uses the word 'cunt' even more than me......

Anyway running alongside THE BUY ART FAIR which mainly consists of an awful lot of shit ( think bad graffiti and air brushed naked ladies,think 1980's heavy metal album covers or pictures of confused looking cows painted in a naive stylie on hills that look like boobies) is THE MANCHESTER CONTEMPORARY which is not shit, and is getting bigger and more interesting each year and is where I got my bits and bobs from. I know perhaps I should have bought stuff by an 'emerging Artist' rather than by Tracey, but to be honest Tracey's stuff, although maybe not as limited was cheaper!

1st Manchester Day.

Image copyright Mark Page

The 1st Manchester Day parade happen today and I really enjoyed it. No nothing to moan about it was great. Am I feeling OK yep, me and the missus had a macca dee's and a couple of pints and watched the parade in the sun. Simple things....... HERE for more on the day.

Fuzzy.

Having had way too much of the Beer at The Inaugural Blacklab Event I could't possibly write any kind of a review, so if anyone was there and had a clearer head email me a review here and I'll post it........

BLACKLAB on PARIS PHOTO.

Don't be taken in by those "puppy dog" eyes. Blacklab have teeth and they are chewing holes in PARIS PHOTO and using the Art Market as a doggy chew. Great stuff from Manchester's new(ish) photo blog. Where are my portraits folks?

Simon Annand: The Half.

Image copyright Simon Annand

Celebrity portraiture normally leaves me cold. Peacocks posing so what? I've had to change my opinion in light of THE HALF exhibition at THE LOWRY. Simon Annan has spent 20 years photographing actors backstage in London's West End during 'The Half', the half hour before the curtains go up.
This is a real tour de force with some stunning Black & white portraits beautifully printed and plenty of them. For me they hark back to a time gone by, they have a classic feel and they are non the worse for that.
If you get a chance go and see It's on until 3rd January.

Impressions of Bradford.

Today I went to visit my books at THE IMPRESSIONS GALLERY book fair Bradford.

First stop Manchester Victoria station, gateway to the world.

I'm full of contradictions me. "News of The World" but brown sugar.

A horse.

Country folks houses.

Thank you it's nice to be here.

First impressions.

The optimist in me thought sending 4 books would be enough.

And as you can see by the crowds I may have been right. I forget sometimes what a minority game we are in.

My manager, assistant, financial backer, harshest critic, biggest supporter and most importantly, my lovely misses Sarah.

The slight time delay on my little Ricoh caught Sarah out thus decapitating me. At least that's what she said.

Wearing robot dressing up gear from an unusual exhibition to find in a photography gallery, toy robots? I can't begin to express just how bad that mask smelt.

You get to a certain age a couple of pints and you need a nap........

Buy Art Fair.

Well that's my first Art Fair as an exhibitor over. I've even managed to sell a couple of prints as well so that was nice. I've had a lot of good feedback about the book as well which has made my weekend. That's the book above on the plinth with two of my prints above it. #18 Bleach was one of the prints sold.

There was a ridiculously wide range of stuff there. Everything from some God awful shit from Austria, pretend paintings of Michael Jackson dancing to work by Jeff Koons! Even Damien had stuff there albeit very small.

There was stuff there by the latest hot properties such as Dan Baldwin (above) So in line with the bullshit of the Art world I am now going to adjust my CV to read "Has exhibited alongside the likes of Jeff Koons & Dan Baldwin". Then I'll stick the prices of my prints up to say...... £30

The National Photography Symposium.

Friday started with the Bolton Uni MA show and the most somber slideshow presentation I have ever been to, maudlin I think is the word I am looking for which is a shame because some of the work was pretty good if a little conservative, and Ian McMillan had kicked things off with an entertaining presentation, I'll feature my favs of the Bolton lot here over the next few of days.

Favourite talks were by Francis Hodgson writer on photography for The Financial Times and former head of photographs at Sotheby's he was "bang on the money" regarding the general state of photography in the UK compared to Europe/US. What did I make of the first National Photography Symposium? All in all a good first effort, I look forward to it growing over the next few years, although I think a different venue is needed. Beautiful though Hogwarts is, what with the creaky clunky doors, too small rooms and them bloody Cathedral bells........

Kiosk Gallery & Comma Films.

Archaeology by Lisa Risbec & poetry by Gaia Holmes.

Spent a great afternoon yesterday down at Urbis http://www.urbis.org.uk/ watching "showreel" which was slide shows from various North West photographers organised by The Kiosk Gallery & also short films from Comma Films. http://www.kioskgallery.co.uk/ Many of the photographers have been featured here on this blog before. In fact in the case of Julian McKenny, David Dunnico and Seba Kurtis very recently.

I'd not got a clue though about Comma Films or Comma press until yesterday. Comma Press is a not-for-profit publishers who concentrate on innovative poetry and short stories who have already made a bit of a name for themselves, described as "Trailblazing" by The Arts Coucil. http://www.commapress.co.uk/?section=about Now if you put that kind of writing together with some great young film makers well you get something special. http://www.commapress.co.uk/

zuperQuirk

Image copyright Michael Ronquillo

ZuperQuirk is an international collective and online experiment, their words not mine. There are however some interesting photographs on the site. Although mainly "street photography" which these days seems to be some kind of weird sport rather than any kind of art, (I have never got my head around why someone of the standing of Trent Parke would get involved with this tosh) http://www.in-public.com/ I blame the flickr AWESOME brigade but I guess that's a whole other post......................

These six photographers however seem on the whole to avoid the usual cliches. So yes although I prefer the work of some of the six lots more than other's it's well worth a look. "Ya getting me" as the youths around these parts seem to be saying. Here: http://www.zuperquirk.org/about/

The Tony Wilson Experience......Experience

Well that was a pretty big weekend. I think I've recovered, just, and I didn't even do the full 24! http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/entertainment/s/1055119_tony_wilson_experience_in_action?rss=yes?rss=yes What I gleaned from the whole event I'm not sure. It was entertaining, It made me proud of Manchester, well at least Manchester as was. Steve Coogan http://www.coogans-run.co.uk/index.php said we needed to maintain the spirit of the place and was a little worried about all the shiny new building's and lack of "Crisp Packets blowing about" which may explain why he's buggered off to Brighton to live. Frank Sidebottom http://www.franksidebottom.co.uk/ who's like Marmite, was well, Frank Sidebotton. Sir Richard Leese was a bit bullish and nearly made some poor bloke cry when he complained amongst other things about The Free Trade Hall being turned into a Hotel. The fella went as red as his hair.

Phil Griffin was as knowledgeable as ever, Tom Bloxham freaked me the f**k out by guessing which one of his developments I'm moving too, http://www.urbansplash.co.uk/ and Shaun Rider and Bez made "cocks" of themselves as per.

All in all it was a good first event, "fine Art" for want of a better word was under represented as was photography, but hayho that's just Manchester and that point was put to Sir Richard by one of the great unwashed with which I include myself. I got a long list of Manchester's young creative's which I'm going to go through and show some of here. Oh yeah and a signed copy of a script from the film "Control" which may soon be winging it's way to Ebay...............

Art car parade

Down at Cathedral Gardens outside Urbis, last Saturday http://www.artcarparade.co.uk/ was a good crack. I even spotted Paul Herrmann from Redeye clicking away!